


Now, It’s Daybreak

by Aesoleucian



Series: Under Waterfall's Umbrella [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Canon Divergence, Gen, I'm not letting the uchiha kids stay in konoha that's the divergence, also some people think itachi is a girl and he's like "yeah okay", idk if I need to warn for that??, mostly this fic is brotherfeels with a side of cat shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-17
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-24 11:19:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 12,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7506265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aesoleucian/pseuds/Aesoleucian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Konoha takes and takes and takes from the Uchiha. Why not find somewhere that will give back?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I finally gave into my urges and decided to publish my Naruto fiction, because there's not enough nice happy stuff for the Uchiha kids. Blah blah curse of hatred, yeah whatever. My city now. If I remember I'll update this every day since the chapters are pretty short.
> 
> The title is from a random line in [Black Night Town](http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Black_Night_Town) that I thought sounded nice and was vaguely thematic.

“Brotherrrrrrrrr.”

“Hm?” Itachi doesn’t look up.

“I’m boooorrrrreed.”

“Get off my arm, Sasuke. You’re the one who asked to come.”

“But I thought it would be cool!”

“I told you it was an errand. Errands are boring by definition.”

“Anything _you_ do is cool, brother.” Sasuke’s pout could practically be weaponized, and Itachi suspects that’s what he’s doing now.

“Well, I guess you’re not really bored, then.” He smiles at Sasuke and turns back to his requisitions list.

Sasuke pouts again and plops down on the floor, barely making it look intentional. He doesn’t have a very good sense of balance yet. “Can I help?”

Itachi doesn’t _want_ Sasuke helping. He’s four, almost five, and he hasn’t learned to handle blades yet. He’ll hurt himself if he tries to help, but Itachi can’t tell him that. Quickly, he invents. “Well, there is something I’ve been wanting for a while…”

Sasuke scrambles to his feet, tripping twice before he gets steady. “What? What is it? I’ll get it!”

“Have you seen that orange and white cat, the one Grandma Cat says is the fastest? I want his paw print, but he’s very proud. He won’t give it to me unless I catch him, because it’s embarrassing for a cat to get their pawprint taken.”

“I’ll get it! I’ll find him! Just wait!” Sasuke clenches his tiny fist, eyes shining with determination, and runs off. He only trips once before Itachi turns away, smiling. That should occupy him for a while, at least, and it will be good for his ninja training.

It’s an hour later, and Itachi is having a slightly hairy cup of tea with Grandma Cat, when Sasuke comes back. His face and arms are covered in fresh scratches, but he’s clutching a crumpled piece of paper with a muddy pawprint on one corner. “I forgot to bring ink,” he explains, out of breath. “But I got it, brother!”

Itachi smiles and sets his tea down. “Thank you, Sasuke. Grandma Cat, will you keep this safe for me? I don’t want it to get damaged on the way home.”

She chuckles and takes the paper from Sasuke, takes the pen Itachi was using to do inventory and labels the paper _Turmeric_ , which is probably the cat’s name. Then she writes the date, and gets up to hide it somewhere safe (or, more realistically, throw it away, considering that it was only a game to keep Sasuke busy while Itachi collected supplies).

Itachi stands and ruffles Sasuke’s hair. “Good job, little brother. I wasn’t expecting you to manage it so quickly. Are you ready to go?”

Sasuke nods and slips his tiny hand into Itachi’s.  “I hope Mom made dumplings.” He still hasn’t figured out that Mikoto doesn’t cook; cooking is something moms do, and she’s their mom, so she must make their food.

“I’m sure she did, knowing how much you like them.”


	2. Chapter 2

Itachi ends up asking Sasuke to get another pawprint for him the next time they’re at Grandma Cat’s depot, out of desperation. Sasuke has not yet learned how to entertain himself, so Itachi has to come up with games for him. “That big gray cat there. She’s a fierce warrior, you know. It won’t be easy to get her pawprint, or I would have done it already.”

This time Sasuke comes back just as Itachi is finishing his inventory, with a bruise on his chin and a row of deep cuts on the back of his hand. Itachi takes the paper from him and sets it on the ground (where Grandma Cat rescues it from another ninja cat trying to sit on it). He kneels in front of Sasuke to inspect his injuries, running his fingers lightly over the bruise. Sasuke takes it well—he just likes to be touched, very like a cat himself. Itachi smiles and calls up the healing chakra he’s been working on, redirecting and resealing the blood until no trace of the bruise remains. It makes him happy to heal—it’s uncomplicated, unlike most of the happiness he manages to keep. When he’s with Sasuke, usually he can forget the dread that thinking of the future brings, but he can never quite fight off the feeling that time is slipping through his fingers.

When he’s putting all his concentration into healing, though, all that matters is making something whole again. It’s—precious.

Sasuke leans against him, eyes closed, and Itachi can practically hear him purring. “Do you want to ride on my shoulders?” Itachi asks him. His eyes open, and he smiles, nods, and climbs onto Itachi’s back. Itachi tucks Sasuke’s legs into his elbows and starts off for home. He thinks that he would do _anything_ to protect Sasuke’s smile.

 


	3. Chapter 3

By the time Sasuke is five, he’s hunting wildcats on the edges of the city. He no longer thinks that he’s doing a personal favor for Itachi, but it’s a game, and it’s a way to impress his brother, so he’s content. Itachi is never content any more, but he’s never closer than when Sasuke grins fiercely and shows him two hand-sized pawprints after only an hour of hunting. He _could_ help Itachi do inventory now—he’s training with shuriken, and he understands basic safety—but this is something he’s not doing for the clan, just something that makes him happy.

When Sasuke is six, Itachi joins ANBU. He no longer has time to make requisition runs, but when Sasuke goes in his place he makes sure there’s a crow waiting with another pawprint commission.  It’s a poor substitute. He’s being pulled away from his brother, and he doesn’t know any way to stop it. Sometimes he thinks about taking Sasuke for a training trip and never coming back, but then he thinks of the Uchiha Clan’s secret meetings, of the bloodshed that will follow if he isn’t there to prevent it. He also thinks of his squad captain, who is an excellent tracker. And sometimes he thinks that he doesn’t care.

One night he climbs in through Shisui’s window, sits on his cousin’s bed with their shoulders pressed together, and whispers his plan into Shisui’s ear.

“I would,” Shisui whispers back. “I’d go with you in a heartbeat, if I thought you really wanted to. It’s been a long time since Konoha was my first loyalty.”

Itachi leans against Shisui’s chest, feeling sick. He’s trapped here, and so is Shisui, and so is his precious little brother, who will eventually be hardened and sharpened into a blade, like Itachi already was at his age. “I do,” says Itachi, eyes growing hot. “I want to get out of here, and sometimes I think that even saving Konoha isn’t worth it. If we _can_ save Konoha.”

Shisui curls his arms around Itachi’s shoulders. He’s only a year and a half older, but sometimes he seems ancient and tired, like Itachi feels when he returns to his house after a mission. “I think those things too,” he confesses. “Sometimes I think that if I used kotoamatsukami on your father he could stop the clan from… doing anything. I could get him to enter peace talks with the Hokage.”

“Then why don’t you?”

Shisui bites his lip. His sharingan have spun into being, slowly rotating as he worries. “I… don’t know. It didn’t seem like something I could do. We don’t get to make decisions, Itachi. I’m thirteen and you’re _eleven_.”

“I’m almost twelve,” mumbles Itachi, and this is what makes Shisui laugh until he has to muffle his head in a pillow. Itachi frowns and folds his arms. “If you’re not going to take this seriously…”

“Almost twelve,” Shisui mutters, sitting up again. “No, you’re right. We’re both in ANBU. We’re not stupid, and we know what’s going on. Why wait? Let’s do it _now_.” Itachi stares at him for a moment, so he clarifies, “Like in the morning or later this week.  Not _now_ now, I need my beauty sleep.”

Itachi laughs softly with unshed tears in his eyes. “Shisui… take care.” He clasps Shisui’s hand and stands up to leave.

“Meet me by the river tomorrow to plot?”

“I will.”


	4. Chapter 4

It’s almost too easy, because no-one expects children, for all that they’ve earned their place as jounin, to take matters into their own hands. Fugaku never notices that his young cousin’s questions about elemental jutsu are anything but innocent, and that night Itachi sees him composing a letter to the Hokage.

Early the next morning Itachi wakes Sasuke, telling him to pack for a long training trip. They leave a note, signed by both of them because Itachi is nothing if not scrupulous, on the kitchen counter for their parents to find. _Sasuke and I are going on a training trip to awaken his sharingan. We should be back in one week._ They’ve timed it so that Itachi and Shisui are both off duty this week, so their squads won’t come looking for them until they’re half a country away. There’s nothing stopping them now. As they walk away from the village, completely unopposed, Itachi feels a fluttering in his gut as if he has been untethered. He can’t let himself believe it yet, but this feeling might be _hope_.

Sasuke grabs onto his hand and swings it happily, marching with an inefficient and childish gait. “I thought you’d be busy forever, brother!”

“I haven’t been trying hard enough to make time for you, Sasuke. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize! I’m just glad I get to be here with you! Are you going to teach me how to do that thing where you bounce the shuriken off each other? That’s _amazing_.”

Itachi glances at Shisui, who is grinning down at Sasuke. “Right now, I’m going to teach you about endurance. Do you think you can keep up with me for an hour?”

“Of course I can! One two three _go_!”

Sasuke can’t hope to match Itachi’s top speed, but Itachi won’t let him know that. He sets a pace that should be uncomfortable but not impossible. Shisui winks at him, and he rolls his eyes.


	5. Chapter 5

They camp for the night, and Itachi realizes he underestimated his brother’s energy when Sasuke runs off happily to find water. He returns an hour later with a bobcat’s pawprint on a scroll. Itachi chides him, because it’s a waste of a perfectly good scroll, but he promises to only use this one if he finds any more cats. Itachi puts a hand on his head and says, “You did well. Even if you forgot to get water.”

Shisui almost chokes himself laughing, and Sasuke, bright red, runs into the forest again. Itachi sits down by Shisui, who says, “That boy needs a cat summons.”

A small smile finds its way onto Itachi’s face, and he says, “That would be an excellent focus for the first part of this training trip.”

In the morning, Itachi tells Sasuke to keep an eye out for especially powerful cats. Sasuke, who is an expert (his cat-hunting skills are much more developed than his kenjutsu)  manages to pin down a mountain lion before noon, and questions it until it agrees to bring them all to the home of the demon cats, Mount Nyandou. Shisui is restraining laughter for most of the time they’re there, because like the ninja cats Itachi is familiar with, the demon cats have a very silly culture. When Sasuke is granted an audience with the cat sage, she turns out to be an imperious calico with six blue flames burning where a bobbed tail might have been. Nevertheless, she offers them sashimi and cream.

“Why should I contract with you, small human?” she asks Sasuke when they’ve finished eating. “I could kill you now and not even notice.”

“I’m an expert at hunting cats!” Sasuke proclaims, pointing a finger at her. “If I defeat you, you have to make a contract with me!”

“Very well,” she purrs. “You may begin _trying_ at any time.”

“Are you sure you can do this, Sasuke?” asks Itachi.

“My big brother would never set me an impossible challenge,” says Sasuke cheerfully as he gets to his feet. “Can I borrow some of your wire and shuriken?”

Itachi hands them over silently. He _didn’t_ set Sasuke this challenge—he never thought his little brother would have to fight one of the great sage beasts.

Then Sasuke attacks, and Itachi decides to get out of the way.

A crowd of demon cats gathers outside the cat sage’s audience chamber to listen to the shouts and yowls as Sasuke fights her. It’s been over an hour when she finally pads out, holding Sasuke by the back of his shirt like a kitten. She sets him down at Itachi and Shisui’s feet and says, “Your little one is fierce. He didn’t defeat me, but I’ll happily contract with him when he wakes up. I think he has some broken ribs.”

Itachi kneels to heal his brother. This is probably the best outcome he could have hoped for. The demon cats gather around Sasuke and start to growl, tails waving in the air, which seems to be their version of applause.


	6. Chapter 6

                                                   

Sasuke’s favorite demon cat summons is the enormous and easy-going Nyako, who lets Sasuke ride on her back.  She seems to like him because he laughs at all her jokes, even the ones that don’t make much sense. In return, he tells her about himself as a fifteen-year-old jounin working for Itachi, who in his stories is the Hokage. Itachi is somewhere between charmed and mortified. Unfortunately, Shisui is entirely charmed and spends almost a week calling Itachi “Godaime Hokage-sama.” Itachi considers doing something awful to Shisui’s bedroll, but in the end he’s too polite, so he settles for a corrosive glare. Shisui laughs at him.

Sasuke, at least, continues to be sweet and hardworking. He trains for hours at a time when they’re not running far away from Konoha, and he doesn’t even notice they should have started going back until the ninth day.

“Brother,” he whispers.

Itachi squints open his eyes; it’s barely dawn, and the air is still a little chilly. “What is it, Sasuke?”

“Did you forget what day it was? If we were gonna get home at the end of the week we should have started going back five days ago. Dad’s gonna be mad we’re late.”

“I didn’t forget what day it is,” says Itachi, sitting up. Sasuke frowns, confused, and Itachi sighs. “Sasuke… we’re not going home. I should have told you when we left, but I didn’t want…”

“Why?”

He looks down at his clasped hands; he can’t look Sasuke in the face. “You might understand a little of how hard it was for me. You know that I was never around when I should have been spending time with you because I was in ANBU. The truth is that Father asked me to join as a spy. I’ve also been approached by… others, to spy on the clan.”

“So everyone was trying to make you spy on everyone else, even though you didn’t want to? That’s awful!” Sasuke’s voice is loud in the quiet morning. Itachi glances at Shisui, but he’s still nothing but a lump of blankets. “They shouldn’t have done that. They shouldn’t make you stay away from your family and hurt them.”

Itachi swallows hard. He’s so, so thankful that his brother is willing to forgive him, but he knows how Sasuke idolizes him. He’s incapable of being angry at Itachi.

Sasuke, oblivious to Itachi’s guilt, wriggles onto his lap and pushes his face into Itachi’s chest like a cat, so Itachi gently strokes his back. He’s quiet for a long time, long enough that Itachi thinks he might be asleep, but then he mumbles, “I think it’s okay that you ran away, but I’m glad you brought me.”

Itachi rests his mouth on top of Sasuke’s head, like a soft kiss. “I’d never go anywhere without you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The demon cats are a pretty much made up kind of creature, loosely based on Matatabi, the two-tails, and therefore bakeneko. Nyako has two tails, although it's a bit hard to see in this picture. I love the idea of the tailed beasts sponsoring normal animals to get magical powers (I first came across this in blackkat's fic).


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hahahahaha transitions? what transitions?

In their efforts to get far away from Konoha, they find themselves in Taki, a reasonably friendly, if wary, village. Shisui convinces Itachi to stay for a while ‘to see how he likes it,’ and because Sasuke misses sleeping in a bed. Itachi, as much as he would like to be the kind of person who doesn’t care about material comfort, desperately loves beds. But he doesn’t tell Shisui this.

Because they are ninjas, Shisui and Itachi have the stamina to build a small house on the edge of town in two days. And because they are _ninjas_ , not _carpenters_ , it isn’t a very good house. “If only Tenzou were here,” says Shisui mournfully, looking up at the stars through one of the holes in the roof. “He builds such nice houses, and it takes him all of ten seconds. Big ones with two stories.”

“You’re lying,” Sasuke accuses. “You can’t build a house in ten seconds.”

“You can if you have wood release jutsu! I don’t know _how_ , since it’s an affinity only the first Hokage had. Maybe it’s just really rare or he’s secretly a Senju or something. Anyway I’ve seen him do it. Sometimes he even makes furniture.”

Sasuke kicks his legs, pausing between brushstrokes. He’s supposed to be drawing a storage seal, but he’s easily distracted. “Do we live here forever now? We have a house and everything, even if it’s a crappy house.”

“That depends on whether we like it here,” says Itachi.

“Doesn’t it also depend on whether Kakashi comes after us?” asks Shisui. “Sorry, _when_?”

Itachi glares at him. “We hid our trail well. Konoha probably won’t find us. And there’s no law preventing us from becoming citizens of Taki if we want to.”

“Will I be a Taki genin?” asks Sasuke. “Do we have to wear their weird headband? It’s not as cool as Konoha’s.”

“You know,” says Shisui, “we could probably get Taki to accept us if we show them what good jounin we are. They’d probably keep us at chuunin for a while but we would move up the ranks pretty quickly.”

“Taki has no need of untrustworthy outsiders for jounin,” Itachi reminds him. “The one thing it’s famous for is having more skilled jounin than any other country other than the five nations. We need to be either harmless or indispensable.”

“And we _can’t_ let them know we’re Uchiha,” adds Shisui. “Sasuke, you got that? We need to come up with a new name…”

“Nyandou!” Sasuke suggests.

“Overruled,” says Shisui, flicking him on the forehead.

“Ow! How about, um, Nekoma?”

“You’re not even trying, Sasuke. Don’t make us part of your cat clan. We should be something cool like Karasutsu. Karasutsu Shisui is a _cool_ name.”

“That’s exactly the same as what Sasuke is doing,” says Itachi, rolling onto his other side to give Shisui his most unimpressed stare.

“Don’t you think crows are better than cats? Don’t lie, I know how much you love crow clone.”

“Shouldn’t we choose a name that doesn’t stand out?”

“You’re so _reasonable_ , Itachi,” says Shisui, sounding irritated. “That’s that I like about you. But you’re destroying my dreams.”

“How about Moriou? Does anyone have objections?”

“Moriou Shisui,” mutters his cousin, trying it out. “Moriou Itachi. Well, it _is_ nondescript. I kind of hate it but I guess that’s the point.”

“I’m Moriou Sasuke,” says Sasuke, closing his eyes and extending a hand to an imaginary person.  “Pleased to meet you.”

Shisui takes his hand and smiles a fake smile. “Moriou Shisui! What a pleasure to make your acquaintance. Do stay with us and help defend our village.”

Sasuke giggles and takes his hand back, then goes to work on his scroll, serious again. Shisui lies back down, head pillowed on his arms. He watches the stars for a little while longer, then turns his head to look at Itachi, his dark eyes soft and contemplative in the lamplight. “We really, _really_ need to buy actual beds,” he says.


	8. Chapter 8

Itachi makes sure not to let Sasuke out of his sight for the next week. In the beginning Sasuke is ecstatic about it, but he quickly gets tired of Itachi’s caution. “It’s really nice that you’re around so much now,” he says earnestly, “but when did you decide you hate fun?”

Itachi gives up and lets Shisui take him to train in the woods. He uses the free time to meditate, a luxury he hasn’t had since he was six years old. When he’s had his fill of being inside his own head, he starts repairing the roof.

Sasuke comes home at sunset, bruised and smiling. “I met a cool girl today, brother. She’s really strong, but not as strong as me. I even remembered to use our fake name!”

“Well done, Sasuke,” says Itachi from the roof. “I’m glad that you’re making connections with the villagers.”

“I don’t know if she’s a villager,” says Sasuke. “She said everyone hates her.”

“I suppose it’s a good thing you don’t, then.” Itachi jumps down from the roof to stand by Sasuke. “I tried to fix some of the holes in the roof, but I don’t know how good a job I did. We’re fortunate that it hasn’t rained yet.”

“Can we just buy a tarp?”

Itachi stares at his brother, dismayed that he didn’t think of it. Finally he says, “That’s an excellent idea, Sasuke. Shall we go into the village and look for one?”

Sasuke takes his hand with the confidence of someone who has never been embarrassed in his life, and starts pulling him in the direction of Taki proper. “Where is Shisui?” Itachi asks after a few minutes. “I told you to train with him because I thought he would be watching you to make sure you weren’t in trouble.”

“I wasn’t! And he was _there_. He was just really boring because he was practicing genjutsu on squirrels. I don’t know any genjutsu yet.”

“I’ll teach you one tonight,” offers Itachi. “After we buy a tarp.” And after he has words with Shisui.

They find a tarp fairly easily, and it’s not as expensive as Itachi feared. The woman who sells it to them grimaces when Itachi seals it in the storage scroll Sasuke wrote—it seems that even here civilians aren’t too fond of ninjas. Itachi can’t blame them, because he doesn’t like ninjas either, though probably for different reasons.

When Sasuke asks if they can buy dinner in town Itachi says yes, because he is very aware of how bad he and Shisui are at cooking. They’ll get better with time, but Sasuke is hungry right now. So they sit in a little oden shop listening to some of the locals talk about the upcoming harvest. One of them comments on how cute Sasuke is, and Sasuke grins at them. After they leave, Sasuke and Itachi have an argument about whether they can seal oden without the bowl for Shisui, and whether it will still be hot when it comes out. Itachi gives in and lets Sasuke pour a bowl of oden onto the storage scroll in front of the scandalized chef. Itachi looks at him apologetically and murmurs, “I don’t believe he could have been dissuaded.”

Then they have to track down Shisui, because he’s still not home when Itachi and Sasuke get back. “I don’t think he’s moved at all since I left,” whispers Sasuke, staring at Shisui’s back.

Itachi crouches by him and gently touches one finger to the squirrel’s head to dispel the genjutsu—it darts away immediately. Shisui blinks dazedly, the pinwheels in his eyes slowing their turn. “Why did you do that? I was _training_.”

“How long were you training?” Itachi asks him.

“A couple hours, maybe. I almost had it, Itachi. Why is it dark?” Shisui tries to stand up, but his legs are shaking too hard and he falls to one knee.

“Because the sun set two hours ago.” Itachi extends a hand and pulls him to his feet, where he is forced to lean heavily against Itachi’s shoulder. “I suspect you haven’t moved for eight hours.”

“Is that why my back hurts so much?” asks Shisui. “I don’t know why I didn’t notice.” He grimaces and leans harder on Itachi, warm and solid but not as warm as he should be. He must be utterly exhausted.

“What could you possibly have to show a squirrel that would take eight hours?”

“I was testing to see if they can comprehend the same kinds of images a human could. And it wasn’t _a_ squirrel, I needed lots of data so I had to do, um, five or something. I wasn’t counting.”

Sasuke grabs Shisui’s hand, because he’s too short to help support him, and says, “Now you’re not being mean to squirrels you can have dinner. We got oden for you! But we didn’t get the bowl so it might be kind of hard to eat.”

 “You didn’t get the bowl?” asks Shisui. “How did you bring it home?”

“We sealed it! Maybe we can unseal it a little at a time, right into your mouth.”

Shisui wheezes out a tired laugh. “I’ll take a broth bath. Maybe I can absorb the nutrients through my skin.”

“Like a plant! We’ll plant you in the ground and water you with soup!”

In the end, Itachi uses earth release to make a clay bowl (Sasuke helpfully hardens it with a fireball) and sets the scroll inside of it before releasing the contents. It’s still steaming, which answers a question Itachi never thought to ask about sealing.

“Sasuke, you’re amazing,” says Shisui fervently around a mouthful of oden. “You’re the best little cousin anyone could ask for.”

“And next time I ask you to watch your little cousin,” says Itachi, “perhaps you will watch him instead of hypnotizing a squirrel until you hit chakra exhaustion. Out of gratitude.”

Shisui’s shoulders hunch over his bowl, but he doesn’t say anything. Itachi wonders whether he would have noticed if someone saw his sharingan. He thinks of the night when they gave up their family name and burned all the patches with their clan crest. And how it will be for nothing if Shisui isn’t careful. But he doesn’t say anything.

                                               


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which we pretend Itachi doesn't use "ore" pronouns so it's possible to think he's a girl. He seems like kind of a "watashi" guy to me. Does he really care about gender that much? Naw.

Itachi meets Sasuke’s new friend two days later. He’s finally teaching Sasuke the shuriken trick—it’s much, _much_ harder without his sharingan, but he does manage it. He can no longer hit hidden targets with it, but it’s a work in progress. Soon he will be able to.

“You’re not very good at that,” says a voice from the other side of the clearing. Itachi looks up to see a child with seafoam green hair leaning against a tree. “I thought you were the greatest ninja ever.”

“I never said that,” mutters Sasuke after he misses hitting his shuriken again. “I said I’m better than _you_. I bet you couldn’t do that.”

“Nope!” says the child cheerfully. “Oh, hi, stranger! Are you Sasuke’s mom?”

Surprised, Itachi says, “I don’t look that old, do I?”

“Oh! I forgot moms have to be like, twenty years older than their kids! Uh, his big sister?”

“He’s a boy, dummy,” says Sasuke.

“I don’t know about that,” Itachi murmurs. “Um, I’m Itachi.”

“I’m Fuu!” says the child loudly. “I’m a girl, even if Sasuke says he can’t tell. I thought it would be cool if Sasuke had a big sister who’s better than him. You’re better than him, right?”

In answer, Itachi bounces two shuriken off each other, sticking one in the tree by Fuu’s ear and the other in the ground at Sasuke’s feet. “I’m better at aiming shuriken, certainly.”

“Brother!” Sasuke pouts at him.

“I bet I could do that!” says Fuu, in direct contradiction of what she just told Sasuke. “Gimme some shuriken, I want to try.” Itachi throws a few more shuriken into the tree she’s standing by, and conceals a smile as she struggles to yank them out. It only takes her four tries to hit one of her shuriken, but she has difficulty deflecting it to where she wants it to go.

An hour later, Shisui finds them crouched around a diagram Itachi is drawing with a stick, illustrating the deflection angles for various combinations of shuriken orientation. “Looks complicated,” he says, leaning over to rest his chin on Itachi’s shoulder. “Can’t you just use your—ow!”

“Sorry,” says Itachi, looking back at Shisui, who is now sprawled on the ground. “Use my what?”

“Nothing.” Shisui rubs his chin, grimacing. “You almost made me bite my tongue off.”

“It’s okay,” says Itachi serenely. “I’m a healer.”

“Wow, really?” asks Fuu. “It’s so cool that you’re good at offense _and_ support! You’ve got to be a ninja, but I’ve never seen you guys around here. You’re _not_ from Taki, are you?”

“We just moved here,” says Sasuke. “How do we get to be ninjas? I could totally be a genin _right now_.” Unlikely, in Itachi’s opinion.

“I dunno. I can ask the headman, we’re best friends. I bet he’d just let you be genin. Maybe Itachi would even be a chuunin!”

“Am I not fit to be a chuunin?” asks Shisui, looking half wounded and half amused.

“Can you do the shuriken thing?” asks Fuu.

“I can do the shuriken thing _and_ I can do body flicker. Unlike Itachi.” He forms a tiger seal and flickers ten feet away—Fuu twists to look around for him and nearly falls over.

“That’s AWESOME!” she says, jumping to her feet. “Teach me how to do that!”

He grins, happy to be the most skilled ninja in the area. “Well, you need really good chakra control and _really_ good legs. How are you at tree walking?”


	10. Chapter 10

Itachi didn’t think Fuu would really talk to the headman, so he isn’t expecting anyone, and he’s surprised when a polite knock sounds on the door of their house. Shisui glances at him and shrugs, so he goes to answer it.

There’s a boy outside, not much older than Shisui, who asks, “May I come in?”

They have nothing to hide, so Itachi nods. The boy takes off his shoes, sets them neatly in a row with the rest, and comes inside. Itachi can see the boy’s doubt as he takes in their very tiny house. It makes Itachi feel small, and he doesn’t like it. “Can we help you?” he asks in a monotone.

“I’m Chiba Shibuki,” says the boy, “the headman of Taki. Fuu asked me to talk to you. I was of course aware that two foreign ninjas were living here, but I was just going to keep you under surveillance until you did something dangerous.”

“ _Three_ ninjas,” Sasuke says, frowning fiercely.

Shibuki smiles, raising his eyebrows. “Yes, I can see that now. What are your aims in coming here?”

“To put it bluntly,” says Shisui, “we’re refugees from Konoha.” He pauses, like he hasn’t considered his next words yet. “Our village… wasn’t kind to us, and we had to leave. We came to the strongest village that’s not in the five elemental nations, because they’re so suspicious they’d never take us in.” A nice subtle bit of flattery there. Itachi approves. “We were hoping Taki might be friendlier. I mean, can you imagine trying to move to Kumo? We’d be killed in our sleep the first night!”

Shibuki nods as if he agrees that’s exactly what would happen. “Of course you understand that we can’t take you in on faith, even if we don’t have much the other hidden villages would want to spy on. And should I be worried about tracking teams coming to find you?”

Itachi and Shisui glance at each other, grimacing. Itachi raises his eyebrows, trying to convey, _Should we tell him the truth?_ This would be so much easier if they could use genjutsu to communicate, but Shibuki wouldn’t fail to notice their sharingan. And the Uchiha clan’s bloodline is known in every country.

Shisui shrugs helplessly, but says, “There may… be tracking teams. We were somewhat important in Konoha. I won’t patronize you with a fake name, but I’m not telling you who we are, either. Of course we can’t trust _you_ yet. But we’ll take care of the trackers, if they come.”

Shibuki studies him. “You’re not as well disguised as you think you are. But I won’t ask for your clan name, _Moriou-san_. I’m happy to put you on a genin team, supervised by one of my ANBU.”

“Be aware that both of us are ex-ANBU,” says Itachi quietly. “If we wished to, together we could overpower any one of your jounin.”

“At your age?” Shibuki frowns. “I’m beginning to see why you left Konoha.”

“You were only ANBU for about four months,” says Shisui, raising his eyebrows. “Don’t get a big head.”

“I didn’t say that I alone could defeat a Taki ANBU. I said that if we worked together we could.”

Shisui subsides. Sasuke, tense, shifts closer to Itachi and leans against his side, clutching his arm.

“I’ll put you on different squads, then. And Sasuke? I assume you want to join a genin team, but you’ll have to take the academy test first. There’s one at the end of harvest time, so you have two months to train. If you both pass, I’m willing to put you on a team with Fuu.”

Sasuke’s eyes widen and he sits up. “Really? I’ll work extra hard! Thank you, Chiba-san!”

“Shibuki-san is fine.” Shibuki gets to his feet and starts to put his shoes on. “Since I’m letting you stay, are you going to get a real house?” Itachi smooths his face to keep from frowning.

“We did our best,” says Shisui. “We’re ninjas, not carpenters. And it’s not like we have the money to rent.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” says Shibuki. He smiles, bows, and leaves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think Shibuki appears only in the anime, and he doesn't have a surname. Here I gave him "Chiba" because it's the name of his VA (Chiba Isshin) and it sounds cute.


	11. Chapter 11

                                            

Itachi’s genin team consists of himself, Harusa Yoyoi, and Toritomi Ginko. Yoyoi’s first words to him are “Wow! An all-girls team? Lucky!” Ginko’s are “Who the hell are you?”

“I’m Moriou Itachi,” he says, bowing. “I’m a refugee from Konoha. Shibuki-san has been kind enough to allow me to work as a ninja, on probation.”

Ginko frowns. “Konoha is the biggest hidden village in the world. What happened that there are refugees?”

“Konoha is fine,” Itachi assures her. “My brother, my cousin, and I are the only refugees.”

“Wait,” says Yoyoi, “ _are_ you a girl?”

Itachi shrugs.

Their jounin instructor arrives a few minutes later, a very small man who introduces himself as Biso. He doesn’t have a tattoo on his bare shoulder, as he would if he were Konoha ANBU, but by the way he moves Itachi can tell Shibuki kept his promise. Even Itachi doesn’t detect him until he’s a few meters away.

“Being a ninja is about teamwork,” he begins, looking each of them in the eye. “Your first priority is to protect your teammates, because they are what will keep you alive.” Kakashi would like Biso, Itachi thinks. He used to say, _Those who abandon their comrades are worse than scum_. “This is a balanced team, so you can rely on each other to cover your weak spots. Yoyoi is a sensor type, Itachi specializes in kenjutsu, and Ginko is a good water and lightning user. In today’s exercise you will be working together to accomplish an objective: find and retrieve a scroll defended by an enemy, me. You have until sunset to get this scroll to the academy building.” He vanishes into mist, taking the scroll with him. Itachi can’t tell where he flickered to.

“How are we going to do this?” asks Yoyoi, dismayed. “He’s a jounin!”

“And there’s three of us, dummy,” says Ginko. “It’s too soon to say who has the advantage. Anyway, you’re a sensor, aren’t you? Track him!”

“Uh, right, right. Lemme concentrate.” Yoyoi closes her eyes and forms an unfamiliar hand seal. “I can feel his chakra about three kilometers that way.”

“Do you only feel it in one location?” asks Itachi. “He must have some way of observing us, since this is a test, and I would guess he left a clone nearby.”

Yoyoi’s mouth twists in concentration. “I sense through the earth, so I’m not sure. He might be in a tree, and then his chakra signature would be too faint for me to sense.”

“We’ll watch out for a clone anyway,” says Ginko. “I bet he’ll send it to harass us. Let’s head for where Yoyoi sensed him.”

Itachi is pleased to note that Ginko automatically falls in at Yoyoi’s side, just behind but close enough to protect her. Itachi mirrors her as they follow Yoyoi.

She has to stop several more times to make sure Biso isn’t moving, but the clone never shows itself. Unfortunately, Biso senses them as soon as they have him in sight, so they don’t have the opportunity for a surprise attack. “He knows we’re coming,” whispers Itachi, and his teammates nod.

“Itachi, you distract him,” says Ginko. “I’ll try and paralyze him with lightning release. Yoyoi, try to figure out where the scroll is and grab it.” They scatter.

Itachi aims several kunai at Biso’s head and chest; he dodges easily. Itachi covers his entrance with an exploding tag, and jumps down to engage Biso with his short sword. Biso is better than him, but not _much_ better. Kenjutsu is probably not his specialty, but Itachi doesn’t give him time to form any seals. He’s also able to make sure Biso _can’t_ dodge the sphere of water Ginko hurls at him—it splatters onto his back, and Itachi disengages in time to avoid the current that runs through it.

“Lightning release: water conduction paralysis!” Ginko crows triumphantly. Biso isn’t totally paralyzed, but his movements are slower, painful, and Itachi manages to disarm him. He slashes open Biso’s vest near a faint lump and…

Biso vanishes in a puff of smoke. “A shadow clone,” says Itachi. “Yoyoi, can you find him?”

A voice behind Itachi says, “Ugh. He must be in the trees. I’ll watch in case he touches the ground.” Moments later, Yoyoi cries out, and Itachi hears her fall. Biso took out their sensor to make himself harder to find.

Itachi goes to Yoyoi, who is lying on the ground. She’s not seriously injured, so it’s simple to bring her back to consciousness. “Perhaps Biso-san hasn’t been told that his team has a healer,” he murmurs. “Can you sense him now?”


	12. Chapter 12

In the end, they do not get the scroll. They find Biso again before sunset, but after engaging briefly he vanishes again. It seems he’s more interested in teaching them to complete missions efficiently than engage in outright combat, which Itachi approves. He’s never been fond of combat, anyway.

Yoyoi and Ginko invite him to come to dinner with them, though he spends most of the time feeling awkward and out of place. But he listens closely for information about daily life in Taki, because he will need to blend in here.

When he comes home, tired but in reasonably good spirits, Shisui is lying on his back with one hand draped over his face. “Hey Itachi,” he mumbles. “I hope you like your genin team, because I’m planning to murder mine. They think they’re _so_ good. They’re really not good. I don’t know why they were placed with an ex-ANBU instructor.”

“Perhaps for political reasons,” suggests Itachi, sitting down by Shisui’s head. Shisui lifts his arm off his face to show Itachi his grimace, then rolls over to lay face-down on Itachi’s thigh. Itachi’s heart starts beating very hard, but he dares to rest his hand in Shisui’s hair.

“Mmf. The sooner Shibuki moves me up to chuunin, the happier I’ll be.” When Itachi moves to withdraw his hand, Shisui says, “Don’t stop. The only touches I’ve had today are from having kunai thrown at me and getting shoved by boys who think they’re being manly.”

Itachi gladly starts stroking Shisui’s hair again. “I haven’t known you to complain this much since you were ten.”

“That’s about the time I got rid of my genin team and started going on solo missions, isn’t it? Not a coincidence.”

“My team is quite professional,” says Itachi. “They already have a good grasp of teamwork, and it seems like the other two have already worked together. We still failed our objective, though, because our instructor seems to be testing our capacity to _find_ rather than _subdue_ targets.”

“My instructor’s okay. She’s doing her best with what she’s been given… Ah, is Sasuke back?” Shisui sits up as Sasuke opens the door. He’s pouting—or rather, frowning. “How was your day at the academy?”

“Taki ninjas are dumb,” says Sasuke. “They say rude things about Fuu, not even behind her back really, and when I told them to stop it they said I’m a stupid outsider who doesn’t know anything. They tried to fight me, but they weren’t very good.”

“And that’s why you have a black eye?” asks Itachi. Sasuke nods, glaring at his feet. “Come here.”

Sasuke sits down in front of Itachi, who tips his head up to touch healing chakra to his right eye. “I don’t mean to deny your right to defend your honor, but there are more efficient ways to do it without getting hurt.”

“Yeah,” says Shisui, who is now sprawled on his bedroll again. “It makes them look really stupid if you dodge every time they try to hit you, like you’re playing with them. They get frustrated and sometimes they cry.”

Itachi tries to give Shisui a reproving look, but his heart isn’t in it. He wants nothing more than for anyone who hurts Sasuke to be humiliated. Shisui snorts and folds his arms behind his head. “We can have dodging lessons later,” he says. “You’re probably a natural at it since you’re so quick on your feet.”

Sasuke grins and leans against Itachi. “Awesome! What are we having for dinner?”

From the look on Shisui’s face, he already had dinner in town, too. Both of them forgot that Sasuke wouldn’t have eaten. They are bad parents. Itachi is a bad parent.

In the awkward silence, Sasuke says, “Should I go have dinner at Fuu’s house?”

“I think we have some ration bars,” says Shisui. Sasuke gives him a withering glare, which is exactly what he deserves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What, do you expect the Uchiha prodigies to know about regular mealtimes for children? They're like, twelve, and their job is murders.
> 
> Shisui's teammates are Kegon and Yourou (you may remember them as the jounin sent to watch Fuu in the Suna chuunin exam arc). They are younger here, so they're still little shits. So youthful!


	13. Chapter 13

Neither Sasuke nor Fuu passes the academy exam, to their own great shock. Itachi isn’t surprised; Sasuke is seven, and Fuu nine, both earlier than almost anyone becomes a genin. Itachi did it at Sasuke’s age, but it never made him happy. Shisui was a genin at six, because he was already training his mangekyou sharingan. Itachi does not want Sasuke to pay that kind of price just for the title of “genius.” They will learn hard work, but they will also have another six months at least to be children.

Itachi has grown quite fond of Fuu; she is endlessly cheerful, but serious in her studies. She reminds him of Shisui, a little, except that Shisui’s cheer is usually used to hide something. She and Sasuke are so devoted to each other that she becomes a regular guest at their badly-constructed house, and they at her apartment in the village. Sasuke would hate the word “devoted,” though. He calls Fuu his rival, not his friend. They will be excellent teammates someday.

Itachi’s team starts to go on C-rank missions as the season turns to winter. He likes them; they are escort missions, retrieval missions, not assassinations. He learns to trust his team, a luxury he did not have in Konoha, where he had to be ready to betray them at every moment.

And still no tracking parties have come from Konoha. He begins to relax.

Fuu hits a growth spurt, and when they pass the spring academy exam she is four inches taller than Sasuke. Itachi, Shisui, and Sasuke gather at her apartment to celebrate, and she teaches Shisui how to make pancakes. She is quite good at cooking because she has lived on her own for as long as she can remember—she doesn’t even have a family name. Many times Sasuke has asked if they can adopt her, only to realize that the clan they claim is completely fake.

Now, Itachi wonders if they couldn’t tell her who they are after all. He whispers it in Shisui’s ear, so quietly that even he can barely hear it over the hissing of oil. Shisui smiles just a little, and nods. “Wait until the pancakes are done,” he says.

Itachi waits until Fuu has stuffed her mouth with pancakes to say, “We’re not really who we said we were.” She raises her eyebrows at him, eyes wide. “We told you our name is Moriou, but it’s not.”

She swallows her mouthful, almost without chewing. It looks painful. “Oh, that.” She winces and coughs. “That was pretty obvious. I thought you meant you were really secret assassins or something.”

“Give us a little credit,” says Shisui. “If we were assassins we’d have killed someone in the first week and we’d be gone.”

Fuu laughs. “So what _is_ your name?”

“Have you heard of Konoha’s Uchiha clan?” asks Itachi. Fuu squints, as if trying to remember the clan lists they learn in history class is physically painful. “The keepers of one of the three great doujutsu?” She frowns. He manifests his sharingan and looks directly into her eyes. “This.”

“Ohhhh! Sharingan! I can never remember if it’s them or the Hyuuga. They both have _some_ kind of eye thing.”

“We’re one of the most famous clans in history!” says Sasuke, indignant. “One of the two founding clans of Konoha. One of the two founding clans of _the elemental nations_.”

Fuu shrugs cheerfully. “It’s not like I ever needed to know that before.” The smile slides off her face, to be replaced with a contemplative expression. “That’s probably a pretty important secret, so I won’t tell anyone. And maybe I should tell you mine.”

Sasuke looks up from his pancakes, which he is fastidiously cutting into bite-sized pieces. “You have a secret? And you never told me?”

“If I told you I had a secret you’d keep asking ‘til I told you what it was, dummy! That’s why I didn’t tell you!”

“Well, what is it?”

“The reason everyone hates me…” Her mouth twists, and she takes a deep breath. “I’m the seven-tails jinchuuriki.”

After looking at Sasuke in silence for a moment, she adds, “I have a bijuu in me. You got that, right?”

“I’m not _dumb_!” says Sasuke.

“Yeah, you are. But it’s okay.”

                                        

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to draw Fuu practicing her ninja arts rather than making pancakes, because I don't understand what a spatula is. Here, she's pictured trying to do a nature transformation and infuse her shuriken with wind chakra.


	14. Chapter 14

Itachi covertly watches Sasuke and Fuu’s genin team practicing. Unlike his own team, they don’t yet have any special skills, and their teamwork is… not good. The third member is three years older than Fuu, and seems to resent her teammates. It’s easy to see why: Sasuke and Fuu work seamlessly together because they’ve been training every day for half a year. Chikusa is more skilled at tactics and clearly thinks she should be the team leader, but they don’t listen to her.

Their jounin instructor gives them a series of exercises where they switch who gives the orders with every new objective, and it seems to help. Sasuke and Fuu are observant, and they notice that they accomplish their objectives faster when they actually listen to Chikusa.

The first time they leave the village on a mission, Itachi slips away to follow them, only to find Shisui waiting for him. “Don’t be such a mother hen, Itachi,” he says. “It’s a low-stakes courier mission. They will be _fine_. Come on.” He grabs Itachi by the arm and pulls him back toward the village. “You’re so predictable. Is it really that bad to spend time with me?”

“I enjoy spending time with you,” says Itachi. “I just want to make sure Sasuke and Fuu are safe. You could come if you wanted.”

“Shut up, Itachi. I _like_ not being on a mission. I don’t feel the need to invent missions when I’m on leave.”

Itachi gives in and lets Shisui drag him back to the house, which is no bigger after the winter but at least has insulation now.

“What _do_ you want to do, then?” he asks.

“I want to take a nap,” says Shisui, flopping onto the floor. Because he hasn’t let go of Itachi’s arm, he pulls Itachi down too. “I’m going to relax and you’re going to relax with me, even if I have to hold your hand to prevent you from substituting a clone. You know that word, right? _Relax_?”

“I have relaxed before,” says Itachi crossly as he helps Shisui drag the futons out from the corner. “I don’t find sleeping very relaxing, though.”

Shisui grimaces in sympathy and puts a hand on Itachi’s shoulder. Itachi knows that he regularly has nightmares of his best friend’s death, perfectly preserved by the mangekyou sharingan. “Don’t sleep, then. But it will help me sleep if you’re here.”

This must be why Itachi always wakes up with Shisui either sprawled over his torso or conspicuously absent. He nods and lies down next to Shisui, who grabs Itachi’s arm and tucks his face into Itachi’s shoulder. “Is this okay?” he asks quietly.

Itachi’s heart has stopped, and he can’t quite remember how to breathe, but he manages another small nod.

He closes his eyes while Shisui tries to sleep, meditating on nothing but Shisui’s presence. Finally Shisui’s breaths shift from carefully deep and measured to shallower ones, so that it no longer feels like he’s silently gasping for air beside Itachi. That makes it a little easier to relax.

Itachi has actually fallen into a light doze when he’s woken by Shisui wiggling under his arm. Shisui hums quietly in his sleep, and never has it made Itachi want to protect him more. Itachi slowly strokes Shisui’s back, which makes him wiggle and hum again, and Itachi doesn’t bother to hold back a smile.


	15. Chapter 15

Itachi has heard what the ninjas of Taki say about him: _A professional assassin? A war orphan? How did she get so good?_ Appropriately enough, he hears these things when he’s skulking around the edges of social gatherings, like the professional assassin he is. The civilians say: _She’s so polite, never gets angry. I wish all ninjas tried so hard to be nonthreatening_. Well, he may be reading between the lines a bit, but that’s the general sentiment. Although _everyone_ thinks he’s a little creepy.

His team is proud of him _because_ he’s creepy. Ginko likes being able to make him laugh, and Yoyoi likes knowing his smaller secrets. They also like being on his team because he can teach them jutsu they’d never learn anywhere else.

So it’s natural when Biso appears in a flicker of mist to tell them he’s signed them up for the next chuunin exam, which is to be held in Konoha. He doesn’t give Itachi a significant look, but they all know Itachi has reason to be wary. They also know he has no real reason to go to the exam, because he has already passed it, but in his mind at least it is symbolic of his commitment to Taki.

“I’m willing to go,” he says. “It would be disadvantageous to break up this team. I will want a disguise, though.”

“Makeover,” Yoyoi mutters under her breath, grinning. A strange mixture of fondness and dread settles in Itachi’s gut. Louder, she says, “I’m not just willing, I’m _raring_ to go. Ginko?”

“When have I ever backed down from a challenge?”

Biso smiles his thin smile. “Excellent. Then I’m going to work you to the bone to prepare you.”

Itachi goes home exhausted that night despite his ANBU stamina, only to find a note pinned to the door: AT FUU’S COME FOR DINNER. He isn’t irritated that he has to turn around and go back through the village, because it means he probably won’t have to cook on the tiny gas stove that sits in the corner. It’s really a fire hazard, and Itachi usually burns his food anyway.

Sasuke and Shisui are both there already, making broth while Fuu makes noodles. Or rather, Shisui is making broth while Sasuke plays with three of his smaller demon cats on the floor. Itachi sits down at the table and tries to look dignified while using the smallest number of muscles to stay upright.

“Brother!” says Sasuke, running over to hug Itachi’s arm. “How was your training? You look tired.”

“My team is going to the chuunin exams in Konoha in two months,” he says, without opening his eyes. “Biso-sensei is working us very hard so we’ll be ready.”

Shisui turns, raising an eyebrow. “You’re going back to Konoha? You don’t think that’s… a really stupid idea or anything?”

“I intend to be in disguise, Shisui. And I would like to see what the political situation is there. I want to know if it worked.”

Shisui sets his spoon down and frowns thoughtfully. “So would I. I want to come too, but I don’t know if my team is ready. Kegon and Yourou are really little brats, no matter how hard I try to train them up.”

“Could _our_ team go, d’you think?” asks Fuu. “I bet we’re better than Shisui’s team.”

“You’re a little brat too!” says Shisui, and picks up his spoon again to tap Fuu on the head.

“You’re getting broth on me, Shisui! And you’ll get hair in the broth!”

“Hair is nutritious. Anyway, I’ll talk to my instructor about it. Sasuke, get back here and stir, my arm’s getting tired.”

“It doesn’t even need to be stirred that much,” says Sasuke. “Fuu told you that to mess with you.”

“Aww! Sasuke, I wanted to see how long he’d stir it!”

“You little brat!” says Shisui. “It’s almost like you want me to kick your butt instead of teaching you body flicker!”

“Noooo, you have to teach me, I’ve almost got it!” Fuu uses her most powerful puppy face, and Shisui grins at her.

“How can I say no when you do that? You’re so _manipulative_ , my young apprentice.” He says it with both fondness and pride. She _is_ a ninja, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hair is _not_ nutritious. It's indigestible.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m so happy that lots of people are reading my fanfiction and I’d like to give a shoutout to the wonderful people who commented! It really makes my day when I hear someone is enjoying a thing I’ve made! I don’t reply to your comments because I’m a socially awkward weirdo but thanks for appreciating my fic. <3

Because a transformation is too easy to detect, Itachi lets Yoyoi bleach his hair to light brown and paint his lips dark red. “You should use lipstick more often, Itachi! It looks really good on you.”

“Please remember to call me Touka,” says Itachi, ignoring the compliment. “No matter how different I look, people—”

“Will get suspicious if we call you Itachi. I _know_ , shut up. We’re not in Konoha yet.”

Ginko, who is sitting in a nearby tree, says, “What’s your cousin doing? His team barely passed muster for the exam, right? So he needs to go in disguise too.”

Itachi grimaces. “He decided that the best disguise is to make sure everyone is too embarrassed to look at his face.”

Ginko cackles and starts rolling up the scroll she was reading. “I can’t wait to see this.”

When Shisui’s team arrives at the south gate, Itachi raises his eyebrows. Shisui is already grimacing back at him, but Shisui’s disguise is by far more ridiculous than his. Shisui is wearing a long, flowing white coat with a high collar, open to a mesh shirt. He has an eyepatch with what looks like colored glass set into it, and has shaved his hair into a mohawk, bleached to match Itachi’s. He’s also wearing red eyeshadow on his one visible eye. Apparently the disguise is working, because even his teammates won’t look at him.

“You look weird with brown hair, Touka,” he says. Most of the gathered genin burst into laughter, and he grins. “Moriou Touya, at your service, and don’t forget it.”

Itachi gives him a despairing look. “Did you take your sense of fashion from the Yondaime Hokage?”

“I pull this off way better than he did, all right? Wearing a full jounin uniform under your robes of office is just _tacky_.”

“He could pull it off because he was an adult,” mutters Kegon. “You’re fourteen and you look like an asshole.”

Shisui cheerfully puts Kegon in a headlock. “That’s just what I wanted to hear! The disguise is a success!”

The last genin team arrives, and finally the whole party sets out for Konoha. Nervous tension is buzzing in Itachi’s gut. Konoha hasn’t outright collapsed—they would have heard—but there are many ways for the situation there to be very bad without the other nations noticing.

In four days he will find out whether he betrayed his village.

                                                 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I dunno Shisui, that outfit seems like such an Obito thing to wear. I wish Obito and Shisui had gotten to be friends, they would love each other.


	17. Chapter 17

Konoha looks so much the same as always that it almost aches. Shisui drifts closer to Itachi and takes his hand, staring across the rooftops toward Hokage Tower. Itachi looks toward the Uchiha Quarter as if he will be able to see through the buildings and into his own emptied-out house.

He lets go of Shisui’s hand and turns his stare to casual interest when their escort arrives. It’s Anko and Izumo; he almost nods to them out of the force of a habit that should have faded by now. Instead he tucks his hands into his wide sleeves and tries to look bored as Anko leads them to their hotel, chattering about how dead they’re going to be if they make it to the second phase.

Most of the Taki genin clear out to explore the city and try to get a look at their competition. Itachi reluctantly lets Yoyoi drag him out to loiter near the training grounds, where three teams of Konoha genin are sparring. Itachi wants to watch his second cousin Kamisa practicing her fireballs, but Yoyoi wants to rate the genin on how dangerous they look. He indulges her by murmuring a list of each genin’s clan abilities, as far as he knows them. Ginko leans over his shoulder, whispering “Oh, _nice_ ” every time someone uses an elemental jutsu effectively. After the spar, Itachi is pleased to note that Kamisa’s teammates are friendly toward her, showing no sign of a grudge against her for being an Uchiha.

Then Ginko insists they go out for dango, which Itachi can’t object to.

The hotel provides dinner, which gives Yoyoi the opportunity to point out all the genin who have an unusually large amount of chakra (and Ginko the ones with bad haircuts). After dinner, Itachi tells them he has surveillance to do, and they grin and wave him off. He heads for the Uchiha Quarter, using all his ANBU training to go unnoticed even by the watchers placed near the hotel for this exact reason.

It looks… peaceful. He can remember a time when the food stalls closed early and most of the foot traffic was due to police officers coming off shift. He saw very little overt police presence on the way here, which is a good sign. Perhaps he can find some way to confirm that this isn’t a false peace, the calm before some storm—but it will involve breaking into Hokage Tower or his father’s study, which he doesn’t want to risk now. Perhaps he can carefully (casually) bring it up in conversation with some of the Konoha genin. Unfortunately this means he will have to be sociable.

Putting that aside for now, he heads back to the hotel and climbs in the window of the room Shisui’s team shares with one other. “Shisui,” he hisses, and several people jump.

“Dammit, It—Touka, you’re going to give us all a heart attack,” says Yourou.

“Just came back from sneaking around, huh?” asks Shisui, who is lounging on a bed with a book in his hand. “Find out anything good about the other teams?”

“Not much. I don’t think we’ll have a lot of competition. I dropped by our old house, too.”

“Oh, really? I was there earlier. It looked quiet.”

“Yes. It seems Dad is getting along well with his old man.” Shisui will understand that he means the Hokage. It feels strange to speak in such an obvious code in front of Shisui’s team, but none of them are paying much attention.

“I told you I convinced them to make up! It’s my silver tongue.” Shisui grins and lifts up his eye patch to give Itachi a broad wink. “Now go to sleep, Touka, we have a test to take tomorrow.”

“Don’t stay up too late reading,” Itachi tells him, “and let’s check on Dan if we have time.” And he leaves.

“Your sister’s so fucking weird,” says someone inside the room.

“We’re cousins,” says Shisui, sounding indignant. “ _Distant_ cousins. We’re barely even related.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When Itachi says "let's check on Dan," of course he means Danzou. That guy needs an unreal amount of checking on.


	18. Chapter 18

The written exam is easy, though Itachi suspects his teammates may have had difficulty with it. They all pass, though, and they are soon addressed by the proctor. Itachi pays little attention to what he’s saying, because he’s heard this speech before, and he’s more interested in looking for signs of stress.

All of the exam administrators seem to be pretty unflappable, well-fed and as well-rested as a ninja can expect to be. This one looks cheerful as he assures a large crowd of genin that there’s a fairly small probability of dying in the Forest of Death, despite its name.

As soon as the proctor is done explaining the rules, Ginko murmurs, “So which team are we going for? Those Kusa nin look pretty wimpy.”

“What about the team from Suna right next to us?” asks Yoyoi. “I bet they’ll have a hard time in the trees, especially if they use wind release.”

“I don’t really think we need to aim for weaker teams,” says Itachi. “I would guess we’re the strongest team at the exam. We should have no trouble defeating whoever we come across.”

“That’s the kind of attitude I like to hear!” says Ginko, slinging an arm around his neck. “We’ll kick whoever’s ass comes after us. We’ll pulverize them.”

They do.

Itachi’s is the first team to reach the rendezvous point with both of their scrolls, which he almost regrets because it draws attention to them. He pretends to take a nap, and hears Yoyoi telling one of the proctors “Oh, Touka’s _lazy_. She could barely stay awake long enough to finish the mission. We’ll give her the summary of your speech when she wakes up.” Silently, he blesses her for her quick lying ability.

Slowly the other teams begin to trickle in. Shisui’s doesn’t take as long as Itachi feared. Perhaps his instructor finally got Kegon and Yourou to take missions more seriously than they take themselves.

He comes out with Itachi’s team to a tea shop that night to celebrate, since he doesn’t like his that much, and because Ginko thinks he’s kind of cute even with his ridiculous disguise.

The next day is one-on-one matches. Itachi isn’t worried about winning, but he is a little worried that someone will recognize the Uchiha’s kenjutsu style. He has already resolved not to use any fire release jutsu—his secondary affinity is earth, which is good for the outdoor arena where the matches are being held, and more effective for pushing enemies back.

Ginko’s match is first, against a Suna nin who uses fan and senbon. She paralyzes him almost immediately when he ignores the water spilled over the floor by a decoy water release. Itachi smiles at her success; Yoyoi hoots and applauds.

In her own match, Yoyoi uses a smoke bomb to give herself freedom to move. She doesn’t have good offensive capabilities, but Itachi can hear her peppering the ground in the cloud of smoke with her poisoned kunai. When it settles, she has a nasty-looking burn on her arm and several cuts, but she is grinning victoriously.

Only one of Shisui’s teammates wins his match; Shisui himself shows off his body flicker too much for Itachi’s comfort, but doesn’t even have to use his weapons when he manages to knock his opponent unconscious with an elbow strike.

Itachi faces a Kumo genin, who is nearly as quick as the lightning she uses. It’s a bad matchup for him because his earth release is weak to it, so he uses more taijutsu than elemental jutsu. It’s been a long time since he faced a serious opponent without his sharingan. He’s rusty, and in his desperation to finish the match quickly he uses one of his more distinctive shuriken tricks to pin her down—though he does use senbon for it, which must count for something. He wins, but his heart hammers with anxiety, certain that they will be found out.

They are.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I JUST started rereading the chuunin exam arc and I realized that that particular exam was conducted in a kind of nonstandard way... I also forgot there was a one-month timeskip?? So that doesn't appear in this fanfiction... just pretend this is a slight alternate universe where the chuunin exam works differently...
> 
> Also, have we ever seen Itachi use elemental nature transformations besides fire??


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Watch out for this one, Itachi has a panic attack. Maybe I'm particularly susceptible or something but since *I* had a panic attack while writing this but you can't be too careful.

Half of the Taki genin are crammed into a dango stall near downtown, mostly in high spirits because Taki did well in the on-on-one matches. Itachi is carefully navigating the unfamiliar challenge of eating dango while wearing lipstick when _Kakashi_ slides into a seat next to Shisui.

“That was some impressive body flicker technique for a genin,” says Kakashi quietly. “Reminds me of someone I used to know.”

Shisui stops with his mouth full of dango, caught, knowing that if he speaks Kakashi will recognize his voice.

“Who the hell are you?” asks Kegon from across the table. “Do Konoha jounin always hang around giving kids creepy compliments?”

“Creepy?” Kakashi looks honestly nonplussed.

“Do you think Touya looks _comfortable_ with you sitting next to him?” asks Ginko acidly.

“Oh,” says Kakashi. “My mistake. Sorry to bother you all.” He flickers silently out of his seat, and a small pile of dead leaves settles in his place.

“What an asshole,” says someone further down the table.

“Creepy asshole,” agrees Yourou. “Do you want us to find him and beat him up, Touya?”

Shisui chokes down his dango, coughing a little. “I don’t really think you could beat him up, Yourou. He’s an ANBU squad captain. That’s what the tattoo means.”

“If we ambushed him—”

“Have you not _heard_ of Copy-Nin Kakashi?” asks Ginko. “Or are you completely stupid? Which one?”

“That was _him_?” whispers Kegon. “No fucking way. Why was he interested in Touya?”

Yoyoi, sitting on Itachi’s other side, rolls her eyes. “Why do you think, genius? No, don’t answer that, you really are stupid.”

Kegon looks confused for a moment, then snaps his mouth shut.

Shisui reaches for Itachi’s hand under the table.

Itachi would have been much more worried about him recognizing their scents, if he had been thinking about it. Now, on the night before the last day of the chuunin exams, Itachi is on edge, hyperalert for noises and constantly expecting a hand to fall on his shoulder. He stops speaking or even listening to conversations, and he thinks Shisui is feeling the same.

He doesn’t let his team out of his sight until nearly midnight, when he climbs out the window to find Shisui’s room.

That’s when Kakashi slaps a seal on his back, and he finds himself completely unable to move or speak, his heart jumping painfully in his chest.

“Your smell hasn’t changed that much, Itachi,” he says, heaving Itachi over his shoulder as he jumps down from the wall of the hotel. “You should have invested in some perfume.”

Itachi’s breathing and heart rate won’t slow down, and although his sharingan have spun to life he feels like he can’t see anything. He barely registers the ground moving by until it stops. A door closes behind him like the lid of a coffin. With great difficulty he forces his eyes blank and black.

Kakashi sets him on the floor and releases the seal, but Itachi doesn’t move, muscles tensed to the point of pain. His brain isn’t working. He can’t figure out whether he should try to incapacitate Kakashi or flee, so he does neither.

Kakashi sighs. “I didn’t bring you here to hurt you, Itachi. You’re technically an A-rank missing-nin, but I’m not interested in bounties. I just want to know what happened, and you were being extremely evasive.”

Itachi gathers himself, takes a deep, shuddering breath, and sits up. “You can’t just kidnap someone and then say it’s because they smell like someone else,” he says, nudging his voice toward high and breathy, not hiding the tremble. “I don’t know what your problem is with me and my brother, but this is definitely illegal.”

“Your bro—Shisui?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about! Are you trying to make up some cowardly excuse to take Taki’s talented genin? I won’t work for you, if that’s what you’re after.”

“Stop it, Itachi,” says Kakashi in a low voice, more threatening for the complete lack of emotion. He takes Itachi by the front of his kimono and drags him into a sitting position. “Stop lying.”

Lying is _hard_ , with his wits as scattered as they are. He tries to force more words out, but he can’t. He’s barely managing to suppress his sharingan, and can’t spare any willpower to speak.

“When you didn’t come back from your training trip I led the squad Sarutobi-sama sent to find you. Your mother came along herself because she didn’t trust me to bring back her only sons. But we lost your trail two kilometers outside the gate, as if you’d vanished into thin air, and that was it. There was nothing else we could do. Did Taki take you by force, or did you flee there for some unknown reason? Where is your brother?” When Itachi still doesn’t say anything, Kakashi says, “I think I know the answer to my first question. Given that you’re pretending not to know who I am, you must want to be in Taki. That, or they’ve altered your memories.”

“Shibuki-san would never allow something like that,” Itachi whispers, nearly a croak. It’s as close to a lie as he can muster.

“All right then,” says Kakashi. “I’ll go and get Shisui. Maybe he’ll be more cooperative. Sorry, I have to seal you again.”

So Itachi waits, frozen and propped up against the wall, for his former squad captain to abduct Shisui and come back to interrogate them. Finally, he manages to calm himself enough to start a meditation technique. By the time the door opens again his breathing is slow and even, and he is prepared for whatever comes next.

Still, for a moment he wonders if it’s a genjutsu when Ginko, Yoyoi, and Shisui come through the door. “I—Touka!” cries Shisui, running to kneel by his side. “Are you all right?”

“Her chakra’s sealed,” says Yoyoi. “There’s probably a tag somewhere.”

Shisui find the tag on Itachi’s hand and pulls it off, crumpling it in his fist. “We took care of Kakashi,” he says, scowling, “so don’t worry.” He takes Itachi’s hands and pulls him gently to his feet. “Hey. Talk to me.”

“I didn’t tell him anything,” says Itachi. “As long as you didn’t use… he shouldn’t be sure.”

“This wasn’t supposed to be an interrogation,” growls Shisui as he puts Itachi’s arm over his shoulder. “He wasn’t supposed to be like this. What the fuck is wrong with him? Touka, do you want to go straight home?”

“And abandon the last phase of the exam?”

Ginko whistles. “I can _not_ believe that’s your priority right now.”

“It’s my duty to represent my village well,” says Itachi softly. He wants to go back and see Sasuke more than anything, but he cannot abandon a mission. “And I have to know what we came here to find out.”

“You stubborn idiot,” Shisui mutters. “Fine, we’ll stay, and _I’ll_ find that information. Can we at least do something awful to Kakashi?”

“I won’t stop you,” says Itachi, “as long as you don’t cause a diplomatic incident. Now, I just want to sleep.”

But he barely sleeps at all, with Yoyoi and Ginko close beside him and his head full of cotton.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the -10 to 10 scale Kakashi's social conflict resolution skills are about a -8. He has no idea what to do if someone doesn't want to talk to him, so... how about kidnapping?
> 
> Why does Itachi have such an extreme reaction? He's a ninja, after all. Well, I don't think he's been the hostage in a lot of hostage situations. His combat skills are good enough and his career has been short enough so far that I wouldn't be surprised if he's never been captured by an enemy. Of course as an ANBU he's done interrogation resistance training but it's pretty different from being betrayed and questioned by a former comrade.


	20. Chapter 20

It is only after he finishes his second match that he learns Shisui has gone. Itachi’s team does not know where he went, but Yourou says Shisui has gone to talk to the Hokage.

“Why?” asks Itachi, and Yourou shrugs, looking uncomfortable under Itachi’s intense stare. Shisui must know that Itachi, at least, does not think it is safe, but both of them have always thought of Sarutobi as the Will of Fire in human form.

Itachi isn’t so sure now. He has started to understand how much more Sarutobi could have done, but didn’t because he was afraid to offend the elders. Itachi has never thought of him as strong, but lately it seems he was very weak.

Shisui returns to the hotel an hour later, finding Itachi where he is pacing in his team’s room. The first thing he says is, “I’m sorry.” Itachi says nothing, but stops pacing, looking at the floor. “I trust him more than anyone else in this village. I told him what Kakashi did, and he said he’ll be punished. He knows who we are, but he won’t say anything. He won’t try anything.” Ginko, who’s been keeping watch on Itachi, slips out the door with a tiny wave, not wanting to intrude.

“I was worried about you,” says Itachi finally. “You trust too easily.”

“Only you would say that.” Itachi glances up. Shisui looks tired, and he seems hesitant to touch Itachi, which is unnerving. So Itachi tugs him over to sit down on the bed, and leans into his shoulder. With a sigh, Shisui hides his face in Itachi’s hair, which is loose over his shoulders. “I’d forgotten how hard it is to be in Konoha. It feels like this village is cursed.”

Itachi remembers how he felt, a year ago, like Shisui was the only person he could speak to honestly. Sometimes the only person he could speak to at all. He and Shisui were set together against the world, trying to protect a clan that only wanted them as weapons. Now something is wrong again, and it feels like they can never be safe.

“I’m not angry with you,” says Itachi. “Nothing has changed. I don’t know why it feels like this.”

“It’s _because_ nothing has changed,” mumbles Shisui into Itachi’s hair. His arms tighten around Itachi’s waist. “I hate being reminded of what it was like. We thought we would fix the clan and everything would be better, but even though they made peace with Konoha it’s the same. Danzou’s still looking over Sarutobi’s shoulder, pushing for war and domestic terror. It feels like giving up to just go away now that we know, but—”

“There’s no way to change a village from the outside,” says Itachi. “You said your first loyalty was no longer to Konoha…” He’s not sure if it’s a question.

Shisui looks up and meets Itachi’s eyes. “To you.” Itachi forgets to take another breath. “How could you think anything else? I wanted to protect what you and Sasuke have.”

“You have it too,” says Itachi. “We’re yours, and you’re ours.” He presses his forehead against Shisui’s, so close that their breath mingles.

“Thank you,” Shisui whispers. “Thank you.” And because he can’t even take himself seriously, after a long minute he opens his eyes and says, conversationally, “I’m going to have to shave my head bald when we get home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He can wear a ninja beanie or channel his chakra into his hair follicles to regrow it or something. Are there any ninjas who do hair-growing jutsu rather than just grabbing and/or stabbing people with their hair?


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for all your comments and kudos, and thanks for reading my story! I actually have the sequel written but I think I'll take a short break before I start posting it. Love you all <3

Itachi is relieved beyond measure to see Sasuke and Fuu again. They are waiting outside the gate, and it looks like they have been for hours. There’s an abandoned pile of stones on the ground from some kind of game, and they have an air of impatience when they jump up and run to the column of newly-made chuunin.

Both of them throw themselves at Itachi and Shisui, and start chattering about the mission their team went on. Some of the chuunin edge away, not wanting to be near Fuu, but Ginko grins at her. Itachi is glad his teammates are so sensible.

Later that evening, Shibuki finds them in Fuu’s apartment. Itachi and Shisui are lying down against Nyako (who got her third tail a few weeks ago, and has been meowing smugly about it all evening), so Sasuke goes to answer the door. “It’s Shibuki-san!” he calls. “Come in, Shibuki-san. Itachi and Shisui are resting.” He sits back down, curled into Itachi’s side.

Shibuki sits down across the room after bowing to them. “I’ve received word that the two of you made chuunin… for a second time. Congratulations. One of the chaperones also told me that you had some trouble in Konoha.”

Fuu and Sasuke know that _something_ happened, but Shisui wanted to tell them about it tomorrow. He nods, watching Shibuki. “You could say that. But I talked to the Hokage about it, and there shouldn’t be any more trouble.”

“You’re staying here, then?”

Shisui lets out a surprised laugh. “You couldn’t _pay_ me to go back to Konoha. I hope whoever they pick as Godaime has enough sense to have a certain war hawk assassinated, and maybe then we’d have considered it, but we’ve made our choice. We’re Taki chuunin now, aren’t we?”

“Indeed you are. In that case, I’m glad I didn’t waste my efforts in getting these.” He half-rises to pass Shisui a sheaf of paper. “You’ve proved your loyalty to my satisfaction, so I took it upon myself to find you a proper house. As a token of my appreciation for taking care of Fuu, let’s say.”

“So we’re adopting her, right?” asks Sasuke.

Shibuki looks at Fuu, who grins and says, “Hell yeah you are!” Sasuke runs at her and hugs her, managing to pick her up a couple inches off the ground, and she laughs as he tries not to fall over. Looking over her shoulder, she asks, “Do you want to stay for dinner, Shibu-san?”

                                     

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What am I the most excited about? FUU AND SASUKE HAVE MATCHING ARMWARMERS. IT'S LIKE THEY WERE DESIGNED TO BE SIBLINGS!


End file.
